Al Qaida

As the most highly visible and destructive terrorist organization of our time, Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida has done more to shape concerns and fears about terrorism than any other terrorist organization in at least the last 50 years. What impact will bin Laden's death have on terrorism in the future? Is his brand of indiscriminate and brutal violence at an end? Of course, al-Qaida was never the only terrorist threat out there. More than 600 other groups have been engaged in terrorism worldwide since al-Qaida claimed its first attack in 1998.

Iraqi insurgents kicked off 2014 with fireworks in Fallujah and Ramadi where Sunni militants - part of an al Qaida group active in Syria, according to news accounts - burned police stations, freed prisoners and occupied mosques. The militants fought under the banner of ISIS, or the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. ISIS was originally formed to induce a withdrawal of coalition forces in Iraq, suppress Shiite populations and establish an Islamic state. The group was first known as "Al-Qaeda in Iraq," after pledging allegiance to the terrorist organization in 2004.

By Jim Tankersley and Josh Meyer and Tribune Newspapers | January 3, 2010

Offering new details into the Christmas Day attempt to bomb a Detroit-bound airliner, President Barack Obama on Saturday said a Yemen-based branch of al-Qaida trained, armed and directed the Nigerian accused of trying to detonate an explosive onboard Northwest Airlines Flight 253. The president vowed retaliation against the global terrorist group, and he gave a full-throated defense of his administration's anti-terrorism efforts in the face of...

The aggressive civil strife occurring in Iraq among the various sects, particularly the Sunnis and Shiites as related in The Baltimore Sun ("Distrust hurts U.S.-Iraq fight against al-Qaida," Jan. 5), supports my observation that the greatest mistake President Barack Obama has ever made in his Middle East policy was to withdraw our troops from Iraq at the end of 2011. Sadly, this was nothing more than an obvious political ploy to enhance his chances of being re-elected in 2012. It eliminated all avenues for the development of a democratic country in the Middle East from which our association with the surrounding countries would have become far more peaceful and productive.

U.S. counterterrorism officials were looking at possible connections Saturday between al-Qaida-linked militants in Yemen and a 23-year-old Nigerian man charged with attempting to destroy a Northwest Airlines plane on its final approach to Detroit Metropolitan Airport. According to a criminal complaint and FBI affidavit, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab carried a destructive device aboard Flight 253 on Christmas Day in what authorities said was an attempted terrorist attack that could have killed all 290 people aboard.

CHICAGO - Federal prosecutors charged a Chicago cab driver on Friday with attempting to provide funds for explosives to al-Qaida and discussing a possible bomb attack on an unspecified stadium in the United States this summer. Raja Lahrasib Khan, 56, a naturalized U.S. citizen of Pakistani origin, was charged with attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization. - Baltimore Sun News Services

By Tricia Bishop and Tricia Bishop,tricia.bishop@baltsun.com | November 5, 2008

A Pakistani national with homes in Laurel and Washington, D.C., was sentenced to nine years in prison yesterday in a Baltimore federal court for financing people he believed were terrorist al-Qaida operatives and laundering $2.2 million in what he was told were illegal funds through an ancient currency-transfer system that avoids financial institutions. Saifullah Anjum Ranjha, 45, was one of nearly four dozen people indicted last year after a four-year global sting - dubbed "Operation Cash-Out"- revealed multiple schemes that stretched from Maryland to Belgium, Spain and Canada.

BEIRUT, Lebanon -- It bears all the hallmarks of al-Qaida: simultaneous suicide bombings against political or economic soft targets, designed to inflict heavy casualties and spread fear. An alleged plot to destroy several U.S.-bound airliners with liquid explosives - which led to a series of arrests yesterday in Britain - could be the largest attack planned by al-Qaida or its affiliates since Sept. 11, 2001. Although British authorities have not blamed al-Qaida directly, terrorism experts say the plan fits the group's pattern.

WASHINGTON - The U.S. military has used broad secret authority since 2004 to carry out nearly a dozen previously undisclosed attacks against al-Qaida and other militants in Syria, Pakistan and elsewhere, according to senior U.S. officials. These military raids, typically carried out by Special Operations forces, were authorized by a classified order that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld signed in spring 2004 at the direction of President Bush, the officials said. The secret order gave the military new authority to attack al-Qaida anywhere in the world, and a more sweeping mandate to conduct operations in countries not at war with the United States.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Rallies around the country continued fitfully yesterday to protest the U.S. airstrikes on a Pakistani village that were intended to kill Ayman al-Zawahri, the No. 2 leader of al-Qaida, but instead killed at least 18 civilians, even as American counterterrorism officials said they were not ready to rule out the prospect that al-Zawahri might have been killed in the Friday strike. Officials in Pakistan, who have examined bodies found at the scene, have said they were confident that al-Zawahri was not killed in the attack.

Only a few months have passed since President Obama last boasted that al-Qaida is on "the path to defeat. " But then, just a few days ago, his State Department issued what it called a "worldwide caution" on "the continuing threat of terrorist actions and violence against U.S. citizens and interests throughout the world. " State warned that al-Qaida is now threatening Americans in Europe, the Middle East, North Africa, South Asia, Africa and Central Asia -- practically the entire world.

It's American drone strikes, not whistle-blowers, that recruit al-Qaida terrorists ("Witness: Manning's WikiLeaks breach helped al-Qaida recruit," Aug. 8). David Kilcullen, former counterinsurgency adviser to Gen. David Petraeus, condemned the drone strikes that killed 700 civilians and only 14 terrorist leaders - a ratio of 50 civilians for every militant: "Every one of these dead non-combatants represents an alienated family, new desire for revenge and more recruits for a militant movement that has grown exponentially even as drone strikes increased," Mr. Kilcullen said.

Last year, in the heat of his campaign, President Barack Obama boasted that he had put al-Qaida "on the path to defeat. " This year, with 19 U.S. consulates and embassies closed and the State Department issuing vague warnings against travel anywhere in the world, al-Qaida suddenly seems resurgent - and as frightening as ever. So which is it: defeated or resurgent? Neither, really. Al-Qaida hasn't gone away, but it has changed - in a way that makes it less dangerous for Americans at home but more dangerous for Americans who live in the Middle East and Africa.

After Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's pathetic responses to the Senate and House ("Clinton grilled on Benghazi," Jan. 24), let's be honest that we don't have al-Qaida on the run (as President Barack Obama claimed during the recent campaign; although, of course, he misses many daily intelligence reports). Al-Qaida will be all over Afghanistan as soon as we leave, is strong in Iraq, and is running rampant in Yemen, Mali, Libya, Algeria, and I'm sure other nations (Sudan and Somalia, perhaps)

A recent intelligence leak confirms something that regular readers of this column already know: that the Obama administration has officially authorized covert support of local "rebel" groups, through government agencies like the CIA, with the goal of destabilizing and subverting the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria. The interesting consequence is that al-Qaida is likely among the groups President Obama's directive now supports. Just think about this for a minute. The president of the United States, according to an intelligence leak initially reported by Reuters, has secretly authorized support of an undisclosed nature for armed fighters in a region, including members of the group now synonymous with terrorism against American and Western interests in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.

Five weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, Osama bin Laden publicly commanded his foot-soldiers to ramp up the violence against American civilians. But five weeks before his death, he privately instructed his lieutenants to refrain from killing any civilians. Did the world's most notorious terrorist have a moral awakening and grow soft? Hardly. His unheralded tactical shift was purely strategic. This month, the Combating Terrorism Center at the West Point Military Academy released 17 declassified documents that were seized from bin Laden's Abbottabad, Pakistan, compound in the targeted killing last year.

Miami -- A government witness testified yesterday that terrorism conspirator suspect Jose Padilla attended an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan in 2001 to learn how to fulfill his religious duty to defend fellow Muslims in foreign conflicts, not to engage in terrorism. The testimony of Yahya Goba, 30, came in the trial of Padilla, a former Chicago gang member, and two other defendants. Goba, a U.S. citizen of Yemeni descent, is serving a 10-year sentence for conspiracy to aid a foreign terrorist group.

By Sebastian Rotella and Sebastian Rotella,LOS ANGELES TIMES | March 15, 2004

MADRID, Spain - A Moroccan arrested in last week's train bombings here surfaced nearly three years ago in an investigation that indicated he had wide-ranging contacts with Islamic extremists, including a group later accused of being accomplices in the Sept. 11 attacks, according to court documents and interviews conducted yesterday. Spanish police searched the Madrid apartment of Jamal Zougam in August 2001, according to investigators. The search revealed that Zougam, 30, had associated with key figures in a Madrid al-Qaida cell, according to Spanish court documents.

Those sultans of style at al-Qaidahave released their line of lingerie for spring, and it's a blast. Tucked away in their secret atelier in Yemen, the fanatics of fashion have come up with an updated version of the exploding underwear that caused such a stir on Christmas Day 2009 when a hapless African lad tried to blow up an airliner over Detroit and only managed to severely singe his private parts. Al-Qaidabomb maker Ibrahim Hassan Asiri is reputed to be the designer of the new nasty knickers.

Back from a visit to Kabul, Rep. C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger expressed confidence in relations between the U.S. and Afghanistan. It's Pakistan that concerns him. "A lot of terrorists are being trained and harbored in Pakistan," said Ruppersberger, the top Democrat on the House intelligence committee. "That's a serious problem. " As if to underscore his concerns, a Rockville man who was kidnapped by al-Qaida in Pakistan last year said in a newly released video that his captors will kill him if the U.S. doesn't meet their demands.